A private demonstration of a new "speaking film,'' which has been invented by three Swiss physicists, was given in Berlin on September 24. Though the invention is still in its elementary stages, it opens up a clear line of advance in the production of a successful speaking picture plant.
In order to secure the synchronization of sound and movement, a new microphone is introduced, by means of which the sound waves are converted into electric waves, which, in their turn, produce fluctuations of light in an electric These are reproduced by photography as small horizontal Hines in varying degrees of density and thickness by. the side of the main film. When the film is shown on the cinematograph the reverse-of this process takes place, the sound being finally transmitted to the screen by an ordinary telephone wire and reproduced through a loud-speaking receiver.
The success which the invention has obtained is largely due to the parison was made between the last-named apparatus. A com-music on an expensive gramophone and its transmission through the loud-speaking receiver. The telephone was proved to be superior, the note, and even all the twangs of the stringed instruments which were being played in another part of the building, being reproduced distinctly.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.